Transcript: Spirit Led

Spirit Led (video transcript)
By David Feddes

We've been looking at some major themes in the book of Acts. First of all, Jesus only as the only way of salvation—he's preached all through the book of Acts as the only Savior. And then we're thinking about being Spirit-filled in a previous message. Today, we're going to focus on being Spirit-led, and then I hope in future messages to look again at the book of Acts on being Spirit-gifted and Spirit-transformed. Today, we want to think about what it means to be led by the Spirit, guided by the Holy Spirit whom the Lord has given us.

And so we're going to begin by reading Acts 13:1-4: "Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen, who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, 'Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.' So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off. The two of them, sent on their way by the Holy Spirit, went down to Seleucia and sailed from there to Cyprus."

And that was the launching of the first great missionary journey of the apostle Paul. Now, when we read the book of Acts and think about being Spirit-led, one of the things that is very striking is all the times that miraculous, very striking, amazing forms of guidance come to lead God's people on their way. And that comes in a variety of ways—through signs and very visible things that are happening, through voices that they hear, visions that they see, angels who come and communicate with them, and sometimes through prophecies that are spoken.

These are dimensions of being led by the Spirit in the book of Acts. At the day of Pentecost, there was the sound of a mighty rushing wind, tongues of fire on their heads—they're speaking in tongues—and nobody has to wonder, "Is something happening here?" They all knew something big was happening because the Holy Spirit was showing himself through signs. And when the apostles were given power from the Holy Spirit to do miracles, these were signs that God was at work in them, that the Lord was speaking through them. And over and over, the apostles' teaching and activities are accompanied by these signs.

When the Holy Spirit comes on some other people who weren't expected to be believers, the Holy Spirit would sometimes send the gift of tongues to them as a sign. For instance, when Peter spoke to Cornelius, a Roman army officer, and his household, and while he was speaking, the Holy Spirit came on them and they started speaking in tongues. And Peter said, "Well, I guess I know now that God doesn't show favoritism, that he's welcoming Romans and Gentiles just like he's welcomed us." So he had no doubt in his mind because of that sign that God had sent in filling them with the Holy Spirit.

Sometimes it wasn't just the signs of miracles and extraordinary things like that but also voices that they would hear. An angel spoke to Philip, and Philip was told, "Now go to the desert road." And then, when he goes where the angel tells him, the Holy Spirit told Philip, "Now go to that chariot and stay near it." You get this voice that just tells him, "That's the chariot I want you to go to." And so he goes to that chariot and witnesses to that particular person who happens to be an official of the queen of Ethiopia and is going to be converted by the Lord.

So the voices will communicate. Sometimes God would send a voice not just to guide in different directions but just to say, "Okay, you're in the right spot." The apostle Paul is in a situation where he's in deep trouble, and he's believed that the Lord wants him to go to Rome, but he's sitting in a Jerusalem jail. And the Lord stood near Paul and said, "Take courage! As you've testified about me in Jerusalem, so you must also testify about me in Rome." A voice tells him what's going on. And that voice is what we noticed in the scripture that we started with: the voice of the Holy Spirit said, "Set aside for me Paul and Barnabas, or Saul and Barnabas, and set them apart for that work I'm sending you on." They heard a voice, and that voice directed them.

Along with voices directing, sometimes there were visions. Of course, the really big vision in the book of Acts is when Saul is still a murderer and somebody who's hunting down Christians, and Jesus Christ appears to him in a blinding vision and calls Saul out of being a persecutor and into being a missionary. He gives Saul that vision, but then he also gives a vision to another person, much less famous, named Ananias. And Ananias has a vision that he is supposed to go to Saul and pray over him so that he can get his sight back and be filled with the Holy Spirit. And it's a vision from the Lord Jesus Christ that tells Ananias to do that. And so he does it. He goes and calls him "Brother Saul," even though he's been a killer, and lays his hands on him. And Saul receives his sight back, is filled with the Holy Spirit, and ready to go for mission.

So visions play a very important role in all of this. When Cornelius, that Roman army officer, was praying one day, he wasn't yet a believer in Jesus. He didn't know that much, but he believed in the one God of the Jews and was praying. And God had made him a seeker of God and somebody who also was becoming generous in sharing money. And one day, while he's praying, an angel appears to Cornelius and says, "Now you're in the town of Caesarea. Send some people to Joppa, a town not that far away. There's a guy there named Peter. Send your people there, get him to come to your household." And so, through a vision, in this case an angel communicating through a vision, Cornelius sends three guys to go get Peter.

Meanwhile, Peter in Joppa is having a very strange vision of a sheet let down from heaven full of animals that you're not supposed to eat. And a voice says, "Take and eat, kill and eat." Peter says, "Never done that, never gonna." And so, "Don't call unclean what God has called clean," is what the voice tells him. And that happens three times. And Peter is scratching his head and pondering, "What in the world is that vision about?" And right while he's wondering, the Holy Spirit tells him that three men are outside, and you go with those three men, and you'll understand what the vision's all about. He goes with them, meets this Roman army officer, preaches to them, they're all filled with the Holy Spirit, and he says, "Yeah, God is saying, I used to think of all those people as unclean, but God is welcoming them and sending the gospel to them."

Not only are there the messages, then, of angels speaking and the visions, but one of the big visions that is another turning point in the book of Acts comes in Acts chapter 16. It says, "Paul and his companions traveled through the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia. When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not let them." That sounds kind of strange—that you're itching to preach somewhere and the Holy Spirit won't let you, that you're wanting to go somewhere else, and God won't let you.

So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. So they're on this traveling journey where they've been to various towns, and they were going to try to go up further into that province of Asia, and they just couldn't do it. And they're kind of stuck in Troas wondering, "Okay, now what?" During the night, Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, "Come over to Macedonia and help us!" After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.

So this vision that Paul has of the Macedonian asking him to come is how the gospel goes into Europe. A lot of us who are of that ancestry can be very thankful for that vision because God launched the gospel into yet another area of the world through that vision. Just as he sent an Ethiopian in the direction of Africa, he sends Paul in the direction of Europe, and he does so through this vision of a man speaking to him and appealing to him.

And as we've already read, sometimes the Lord will speak in all these different ways. He speaks to Paul in the town of Corinth. Sometimes the Lord gives a vision—"Hey, you’ve got to move. Here’s where you’ve got to go next." Other times, he sends a vision and says, "Here’s where you’ve got to stay." Because he preaches in Corinth and runs into some opposition, but then the Lord speaks to him in the night and says, "Do not be afraid. Keep on speaking. Don’t be silent, for I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city." He hasn’t won them over yet—they aren’t even converted yet—but God says, "I have them. You’re going to get them." And so Paul spends the next year and a half in Corinth, evangelizing and bringing the gospel to people and teaching them, because he’s had this vision to stay put, knowing God has people there.

Well, angels play a big part in all the communication. When the apostles, early in the book of Acts—Acts chapter 5—get locked up, an angel of the Lord comes to them at night and gets them out of prison. And he doesn’t say, "Get out of town." He says, "Go right back into the temple and preach this new life." So, following the angel's direction, they leave the prison, of course, and then go back to the temple and preach. Peter gets locked up in prison and is scheduled for execution, and God sends an angel. Peter thinks he’s having a vision, but this isn’t a vision—this is an angel showing up, taking off his handcuffs, leading him right out of the jail, out the outer gate, and out of there. Then he tells Peter what to do in that whole process. This time, it’s time for Peter to get out of town. But again, he’s rescued by angels and receives guidance from them.

Another form of guidance: angels come to Paul in a very dicey situation. He’s in the middle of a two-week-long horrible storm. He’s been through three shipwrecks already in his various journeys, and now he’s about to have a fourth one. An angel of the Lord Jesus Christ speaks to him and tells him nobody on board is going to be lost. So Paul tells everybody, "Hey, I’ve got this message. We’re all going to make it. Let’s all eat some food. Let’s get ready, because we’re going to have a wreck, but we’re all going to make it." And so the Holy Spirit, through angels, communicates with the apostle.

There are also prophets, and the prophets don’t always give encouraging news—sometimes it’s tough news. Paul is on his way to Jerusalem, and some prophets say, "Don’t go." The Bible says they’re speaking through the Holy Spirit, but it’s not actually the Holy Spirit saying not to go. He’s letting Paul know what’s going to happen. He lets those prophets know what’s going to happen, and they conclude he shouldn’t go, because bad things are going to happen. But the Holy Spirit has told Paul, "Bad things are going to happen, and you need to go anyway." So sometimes that leading through the prophets about what’s going to happen doesn’t necessarily tell you to make a U-turn so the bad stuff doesn’t happen. Sometimes it’s just to confirm, "You know what you’re getting into."

So you have those prophets who are speaking that way. There’s a prophet named Agabus, who is very dramatic. Earlier in the book of Acts, Agabus predicts a famine, so the churches take a big offering for the famine victims, who aren’t even famine victims yet. The offering is ready before the famine even hits because Agabus told them this thing’s coming—kind of like Joseph in the Old Testament foresaw a famine in Egypt, so they were ready for it when it happened. At any rate, Agabus later appears again. He takes Paul’s belt, ties himself up with it, and says, "This is what’s going to happen to you when you get to Jerusalem." And so all the people say, "Oh, please don’t go, please don’t go." And Paul says, "Why are you sitting around here bawling and breaking my heart? I’ve got to go. The Holy Spirit tells me in every town I go, I’m going to run into trouble. Why would this trip be any different?" So he just makes a beeline for Jerusalem anyway.

The point here, though, for our purposes is that there were prophets, even in that group in Acts 13 at the very beginning. These were people who were prophets who sometimes had a message from the Lord about what was going to happen next, and that was part of the Holy Spirit’s supernatural guidance for them. So when you think about being Spirit-led, there are these striking cases in the book of Acts of signs, voices, visions, angels, and prophecies. It’s really very interesting reading and very dramatic.

When we think about guidance, we may say, "Well, that’s how the Spirit guides." And it’s true—that’s one type of means that the Spirit uses to guide: the very striking, miraculous, supernatural way of guiding. When you read about that kind of guidance, some frequently asked questions come up. Should I always find out God’s detailed individual will before I make a decision? Over time, some Christians have kind of turned these stories into a system. And the system is that because God gave specific guidance at times in the book of Acts, you should never make a decision unless you’ve got the nudge, the go-ahead, and the clear leading of the Lord. And God has an entire map laid out for your life, and your job is to find out the next step on the map and take that as it’s revealed to you. Is that how it works?

And the short answer is no. God does not promise that you will always know what’s coming next, and therefore you will only get God’s second-best or third-best if you haven’t figured out what that next step of God’s perfect plan for you is going to be. The Bible is very plain that we don’t know the future. Writing to Christians, James says, "You don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow." He doesn’t say, "And therefore, try really hard to figure out what’s going to happen tomorrow, and then make your decisions accordingly." So we do not have to figure out the exact map of the future or the next step and then wait until we know what that step is from the Holy Spirit directly before we take it.

On the other hand, there may be times of very striking, miraculous leading, and someone senses that. Or maybe somebody talks to you about that, and you say, "Well, I know what that means—that means they’re a little off." If somebody claims miraculous leading today, is there a screw or two loose? Are they mentally unstable? Not necessarily. The Holy Spirit, who guides his people, may still guide in quite extraordinary ways. And we shouldn’t be too quick to dismiss extraordinary leadings from the Holy Spirit.

A third question: Should I expect the Spirit to lead me by all the same methods that he used in Acts—through signs, voices, visions, angels, prophecy, and so on? Well, there I would say yes and no, because there are more ways. And we're going to look at those in the book of Acts that the Holy Spirit uses to guide people—not just the miraculous, "Whoa, that was amazing," and unbelievable, almost, how direct and striking that is.

A couple of things to keep in mind: One is, what is the book of Acts? Well, it’s a history of the church’s foundational period. It is a unique time that ended after the apostles died and the New Testament was finished. Now, some people take that fact and turn it into a system too, and say, "That was a unique age, and therefore we should not expect very much to be similar in the age we live in." Those signs and miracles and wonders were done to accompany the apostles and their close associates. And we ought not to assume that everybody who’s not an apostle, not an associate, not living in that special age of the church before the New Testament was completely written down, is going to need the same kind of guidance that they got back then when they didn’t yet have the full New Testament.

And there’s a lot to be said for that position. The book of Acts is describing a unique period of laying the foundation, and there aren’t more apostles today in the same sense that those apostles were eyewitnesses to Jesus Christ and directly taught by the Holy Spirit to speak infallibly without error and to write without error the books of the New Testament. That was a unique age—the foundation’s not going to get laid all over again.

On the other hand, it is the launching of a new age. And so Acts is a portrait of what a lively church and mission look like in the new covenant age of the Holy Spirit. And that age, launched by the Spirit, is still ongoing. It continues until Jesus Christ returns. Both of these facts need to be kept in mind when we’re thinking about the gifts of the Holy Spirit, but also the guidance of the Holy Spirit and being Spirit-led.

If you're not involved very much in God's mission but you would like direct leading about a good decision so that it doesn't turn out badly—you wouldn't want to buy a house in a neighborhood that's going to go down a lot in the next five years—so you pray, "Lord, please, you know, send me the Macedonian message. I want a vision of what house to buy so that my new purchase doesn't bomb."

Now, that doesn't mean you shouldn't pray about a house purchase. It does mean that you are not exactly on the pioneer edge of mission, with people shooting at you and God sending reassurances and specific directions on where to go next to carry on his mission. And so, not only are we in a different era, so to speak, but also the kind of guidance that God gives in Acts is guidance to lead his people in his mission.

He might—yeah, I hate to say this because I know some people who've just bought houses that may turn out beautifully. They may skyrocket in value and become everything you ever wanted—a beautiful house. But it may be that he put you in that neighborhood for no reason whatsoever connected to the property itself. The property value might go down. Perhaps God guide you, not to fatten your finances,. Instead,  it might be the people he wants you to meet when you're in that neighborhood. And it may not have much to do with your financial standing at all. He may want you there, but for reasons quite different than the ones we weigh when we make a purchase.

At any rate, what is Acts? It is unique and foundational, but at the same time, it is the launch of the ongoing age to acquaint us with the Spirit's work. And so I believe we should read the book of Acts with a view toward understanding the work of the Holy Spirit, many—if not all—dimensions of which are still going on today.

And when we think about the Spirit's leading, I just want to give a very quick overview of where the Spirit leads. He leads you to know, love, and trust Jesus. He's called the Spirit of Christ. He's called the Spirit of Jesus. Jesus said, "I'm going to send you the Counselor, and he's going to bear witness to me. He's going to take from what is mine and make it known to you." The Holy Spirit is always leading you to Jesus.

He leads you to relate to God as your Father. The Spirit moves us to cry out, "Abba, Father," and know that our Father loves us. He's called the Spirit of truth, and one of his major works is simply to help us understand and relish the truth of God that he reveals. He's the Holy Spirit, which means he convicts us of sin, leads us out of sin, makes us reject it, repent of it, and pursue holiness instead.

The Holy Spirit is also called the down payment on the future, and so he causes us to long for that future—that full future—when everything is made new and heaven comes to earth. He's the Spirit who intercedes for us, according to Romans 8. He's the Spirit who helps us to relate to God and have a prayer connection with God.

And yes, he's also the Spirit who does direct our steps into the unique purposes that God has for us as individuals. He does have plans for your life, and he will reveal some elements of those plans or give you some guidance as needed to lead you along the path of those plans.

And I want to think with you about how he does that particular purpose—how he leads you into the unique purposes that he has for you. And that's what I want to focus on for the remainder of the message: how the Spirit leads.

And we've looked at the last one—he guides miraculously—but that is going to be the last one, you know, that I talk about. And I'm not going to say a lot more about it. There are other ways that he uses in the book of Acts, and I want to be very alert to those.

He applies the Scriptures to our lives. He gives the Bible, and then he helps us to know what the Bible means and what it means for us. He speaks—he leads people—but often he does that in the context when they're praying and worshiping in his presence. When they're open to him and delighting in him, they're a lot more likely to hear from him.

He directs through a leadership body. We'll see that in Acts. He arranges events for his purpose—some of his guidance just comes with, "Okay, this stuff happened, and it plunks me in a certain situation, and now I work from there." Sometimes he speaks to our spirit and through our spirit, and we have thoughts and a sense of what he wants. It's like an inner voice—you might not hear a voice with your ears, but he gives you certain thoughts that seem to have the quality of coming from God.

And not only specific thoughts, but even more importantly, he gives you the mind of Christ, or what the Bible also calls the mind of the Spirit. This makes you a wise, mature person whose very instincts and way of thinking are so in tune with Christ that you don't need a pile of specific guidance. You just kind of think and feel and react the way Christ would. J.I. Packer says that we almost develop a "Christ-instinct." That’s what is involved in the mind of Christ.

And then, not to dismiss or in any way knock the miraculous guidance, because sometimes the Holy Spirit may still use that today.

Now, when we think about these, the first is simply Scripture. And I would say, ignore all the other six that come after it if you haven't gotten this one down. If you're not listening to Scripture, if you're not listening to the Bible, you're wasting your time hoping for God's guidance. He may give it anyway, but don't count on it. The main way in which God makes himself known and communicates is through the writings of the Bible.

When you look at the book of Acts, that might be easy to overlook if you're really struck by the visions and the angels and this and that. But notice how they preach. Peter gets up on Pentecost, and what does he do? He says, "Well, all this stuff that's happening—this is what the prophet Joel talked about. And by the way, in the Psalms of David, here's what David had to say about the future Messiah." So he's preaching from the Scriptures.

When Stephen preaches, Stephen gives an overview of Old Testament history and then applies it to them right then and there. He says, "Now this Christ was the one that it was all leading up to, and you've crucified him." So he's preaching from Old Testament history.

When you look at what Philip does—Philip is talking in that chariot, you know, as we saw earlier. An angel told him to go to the road. "Cool! An angel talked to me." Then the Holy Spirit said, "Now go to that chariot." Yeah, man, that would be cool if I just had somebody talking to me and telling me, "Go over to that chariot." What does he do when he gets to the chariot? Oh, this guy's reading the Bible, and he doesn't quite know what it's talking about. He's reading Isaiah 53. "Well, I'll tell you what Isaiah 53 is about," says Philip. And he explains, "He was despised and rejected by men. He bore our griefs, carried our sorrows." That's Jesus.

So he's basically just giving a Bible explanation after all that extraordinary guidance that got him to the Ethiopian. He tells him, "The Bible was talking about Jesus."

And when you read Paul's journeys, it says that he would reason with them from the Scriptures. Apollos would preach from the Scriptures and demonstrate from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Messiah.

And so, the leading of the Holy Spirit is, above all, a leading into the Scriptures. We sometimes say, "When we read Acts, we think, 'Boy, the apostles were led in this way. I'm going to be led in that way.'" Maybe so. But put yourself in the position of the audience of the apostles, because that's really what you are. And the audience of the apostles is constantly being told what the Scriptures say about Jesus.

So if you want to have the Holy Spirit's leading, be ready to listen to the Scriptures. The Bereans were considered nobler people than some of the others because when they heard Paul preach, they said, "Well, he might be right. We're going to check and see whether it matches up with the Scriptures that we already have." And they would consult those Scriptures and say, "Yep, yep, he's right." And they came to believe in Jesus because of consulting the Scriptures.

Another way that the Spirit speaks is in the context of prayer and worship. We've already seen that the men in Antioch—Paul and Barnabas and the others, who were prophets and teachers—were fasting and worshiping when the Holy Spirit came to them and spoke to them.

And that happens in other situations too. Before Pentecost, what’s going on? Those early believers are meeting in the home, and they're praying, and they're praying, and they're praying. And it is in the context of their prayer meetings that the Holy Spirit comes on them in such power and communicates with them and launches the gospel.

Cornelius had an angel appear to him. But don't forget that he was praying at the time the angel came to him. Peter had a vision from heaven. But don't forget that he was praying when he fell into the trance that brought about that vision.

So the Spirit is the Spirit who helps us in prayer. And if you want to hear from the Spirit, be much in prayer.

You know, it may seem almost too obvious to say, but we always have to pay attention to the obvious because you can say, "I want to get into the cool stuff where I'm getting all that amazing guidance from the angels and the visions." Read your Bible and pray a lot, and there will be an awful lot of guidance coming to you. You know, maybe you've seen the commercial—some guy is sitting there saying, "I wish God would speak to me." He’s got an open Bible right in front of him. Well, dude, he is! Perk up and listen.

So you have these prayer meetings again. In Acts 13, those leaders are all praying together when the Holy Spirit speaks and sends them out. Then he also directs through leaders. Sometimes, when we think about Spirit guidance, we want to think about individual Spirit guidance. But as individuals, we receive a lot of guidance from the leaders that God raises up, and that's a part of the book of Acts as well. You read about apostles. You read about them appointing deacons: "Choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom." These are the guys who are going to administer the program for the widows and for the people in need. Still today, God has people whose main calling is to look after the financial affairs and the material well-being of people in the church, and we call them deacons.

Paul and Barnabas, on their missionary journeys, appointed elders in every church—that was just standard procedure. You're going to have some people who are going to be called to answer to God and also to lead on God’s behalf. Then there's the great council in Jerusalem in Acts chapter 15. The apostles and elders are gathered together, and again and again it refers to the apostles and the elders. At that gathering, there is a very great need for the Spirit's leading because the apostles have had a lot of success in their mission journeys. But there are some people wondering, "What does this mean for non-Jewish people?" Some say, "They've got to become Jews—get them circumcised, get them observing the diet laws, make sure they’re doing everything Moses told us to do, and then maybe they'll be good to go."

The challenge is that this is not what the Holy Spirit was leading. So they got together in Jerusalem, meeting with the apostles and the elders. Peter stood up—first of all, some Christians who had been Pharisees, or still were Pharisees, stood up and said, "You've got to be circumcised. You’ve got to do everything Moses said, or you cannot be saved." Peter said, "What are you guys talking about? Didn't the Lord reveal to me that he accepts everybody? While I was still speaking to them, the Holy Spirit came on them. If God gives his Holy Spirit to them without doing all that, he’s already accepted them. It’s by the grace of God in Jesus Christ that we’re saved." Peter sat down. Paul and Barnabas stood up and said, "Well, we’ve been traveling. We've been in a lot of different towns. We've been preaching the gospel. You want to know what he's doing? He's leading all kinds of people to faith in Christ. They're receiving the Holy Spirit, and they’re not getting circumcised or observing all those other laws. Looks to us like God’s accepting them without requiring all that."

Then James, the brother (half-brother) of Jesus, stood up and said, "Well, I've got a Bible passage here. It says in the book of Amos that God is going to restore his fallen tent, and when he does, the Gentiles are going to come to the Lord. I don't think we ought to make it hard for them." So they all discussed it, came to one mind, and wrote a letter to the church in Antioch and other Gentiles, saying, "Well, it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us..." The Holy Spirit had worked through their gathering, meeting, and discussion as apostles and elders. They concluded, "It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us that we're not going to lay a bunch of burdens on you." And that letter was received with great joy.

It’s important to realize that this guidance is just as much—maybe even more (though I won’t say more)—the leading of the Holy Spirit than the visions and so on. This was guidance for the public life of the church and for how they were going to move forward into the future. It wasn't enough just to have a vision here or there. They had the Bible, the teaching of the apostles and elders, and guidance on what they needed to do. By the way, elders is plural; apostles is plural.

If you're looking for the grand potentate of the church—the one person who alone receives wisdom, visions from the Lord, and tells you all what to do—find somebody else. Elders and apostles are always plural. There is not one vicar of Christ on earth. There is not one vicar of Christ in your congregation who knows it all, so nobody else needs to be consulted. Be aware that he directs through a leadership body.

Another important thing: he arranges events for his purposes, and not always in ways we would have liked or expected in advance.

What is one of the great missionary moments in the book of Acts? One of them is Stephen's death. He gets killed, and everybody who's a Christian in Jerusalem is out of there—except the apostles. It's just a mess. "On that day a great persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria." What a tragedy!

Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went. Oh! So you have this persecution, which seems like a calamity. But now, all of a sudden, the gospel is scattered everywhere. They had been told by Christ to go to all nations, but they hadn’t quite been doing that yet. They were really enjoying the fabulous growth of the church and the blessings on it in Jerusalem. But it was when things got into a mess that they were spread out to preach the gospel elsewhere. Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah there. The Samaritans got to know Jesus Christ, in part, because of the persecution that arose after Stephen’s death.

Those who had been scattered by the persecution that broke out when Stephen was killed traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, spreading the word only among Jews. But some of them went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks also, telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus. So now, this persecution scattered people all over the place, and they weren’t just talking to Jews about Jesus—they were talking to Gentiles. This was one of the big moments in the history of the church. And it wasn’t the fun, exciting leading of the Holy Spirit—it was the "Get out of here or we're going to kill you" kind of leading.

When you read about Paul’s journeys, how is Paul led by the Holy Spirit? Well, sometimes he has the vision of the man from Macedonia saying, "Here’s where you need to go next." Sometimes, he’s led by a posse chasing him—so he gets out of town fast, onto the next one. You see this again and again in the book of Acts. "Oh, it’s time to hightail it out of town now." Not always does he leave town because of opposition. Sometimes the Holy Spirit tells him to stay in town longer. Sometimes Paul knows opposition is coming even before he goes, and he goes anyway. But often, circumstances dictate his actions.

Sometimes Paul even needs a little help to know what to do. You read about a riot of idol worshipers shouting, "Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!" They fill the stadium, screaming their lungs out. And Paul says, "I should go in there and preach to them." But the brothers dissuade him. They say, "Okay, Paul, preaching—great idea, but not today. Going into a stadium full of bloodthirsty rioters? Maybe a different day would be better for that sermon."

So circumstances very often dictate where the apostles and witnesses need to go next.

Do you ever have that? I mean, when we're looking for the Holy Spirit's leading in our lives, we need prayer and Scripture. We also need to think about, "Hey, why am I in this situation?"—and not as a way to beat yourself up. Because sometimes, when something bad happens, you say, "Oh, what did I do wrong?" Maybe nothing. Maybe God just wanted to shift your life.

I’ve had it a few times in my life where I made a change—a big change—and I thought people didn’t quite handle it right in relation to me. Well, then my task is not to be mad at them. It’s to say, "Well, maybe they’re right, maybe they’re wrong, but now it’s time for a new phase."

When we were looking at moving to Michigan, we were going to move there and work with the prison ministry—what could be wrong with that? But we couldn’t sell our house. So here we are. You know, there are simply circumstances that sometimes shape where you end up. With Paul, those circumstances sometimes meant he’d get hounded from one town to the next and to the next. And boy, he covered a lot of towns by the time that was all over. His missionary journeys carried him to many different places.

Sometimes, the circumstances involved wicked people—bad rulers hoping to get a bribe. He didn’t pay it, so he sat in jail a while longer. Another ruler knew he was innocent—"Oh, too bad. I think I'll keep some people happy." Politically expedient: "Keep you in jail, Paul. In jail you stay." Well, you know, that ruins your life. "I guess I'll just have to write a few of those letters that people are still reading 2,000 years later."

Sometimes, getting in jail is not what you choose, but God has some things in mind. You know, when you’re too busy, you don’t do much writing. When you’ve got nothing to do but write, you write. And of course, there were those four shipwrecks and a variety of other things. Through all that, the Holy Spirit was at work. Paul ends up in Rome—it wasn’t the trip he planned, it didn’t happen at the timing he planned, and a lot of things went differently—but he got there.

You’ll find that in your life too. Sometimes, only looking back can you say, "Well, now I can kind of maybe see what the Lord was up to." But in the middle of it, it’s just one thing after another. If, at every step of the journey, you’re saying, "What is the Holy Spirit putting me in this situation for? What is He directing me towards?"—then you can really live a life led by the Spirit, rather than saying, "Well, my life is just one event after another, and it makes no sense, and it’s kind of a jumble."

He speaks to our spirit and through our spirit. Here, we need to understand that the Holy Spirit lives inside people who belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. He’s the one who led us to faith in the first place, and as He dwells in us, He teaches us. He communicates to us through our spirit, through our mind, through our heart and emotions, through the desires, the instincts that we develop.

The Bible says, "The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord." The Lord works in your spirit. And that’s even more true when His Holy Spirit is living inside you and testifying to your spirit. "Those who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God." You receive the Spirit of sonship, and by Him, we cry, "Abba, Father." The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.

So, one way that He’s speaking to our spirit is by giving us assurance—telling us that we’re loved. God pours out His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us. One of the great ways of receiving the leading of the Holy Spirit is just knowing that, in some way mysterious beyond our explanation, our spirit and His Spirit intermingle.

You’re going to have thoughts that aren’t just yours, and part of walking in the Spirit is learning to recognize the quality of a thought that comes from beyond you—a thought that the Holy Spirit puts into your mind. An idea, something that I need to do—it wasn’t on my to-do list, maybe, but having thought of it, all of a sudden I know, "I need to do that."

The more you live the Christian life, the more you’ll recognize that you’re not just thinking your own thoughts—there are thoughts coming from Him. Not always in the form of an audible voice or a vision, but He is communicating through your own thinking in a way that almost becomes His inner voice.

The feelings you have—the mind of Christ—sometimes it’s just having a mind of humility and feeling certain things in a situation. When you’re walking by the Spirit, you still need to evaluate because some feelings—you’ll know right away—they’re not coming from Him. They’re just not. But other ones—you’ll say, "I don’t think I would feel that way if it weren’t the Holy Spirit causing me to feel grief for someone who’s perishing, or to feel a great concern for the homeless, or to feel outraged by a certain injustice." That’s coming from the Holy Spirit.

Above all, when He testifies with our spirit that we’re children of God, don’t just say, "Well, that’s just kind of wishful thinking on my part." The Bible says that’s the Holy Spirit giving you that trust and faith and imprinting it on your mind, heart, and desires.

This is the great mystery of the Holy Spirit's work within us. I don’t think we’ve grasped fully what the book of Acts and the rest of the New Testament are saying to us if all we’re looking for is the outer—just the outer visions, signs, and angels. Because according to the Bible, the most intimate work, leading, and blessing of the Holy Spirit isn’t the fact that He’s out there sending signals, but that He’s in here.

You’re thinking His thoughts. You’re feeling His feelings. Your spirit has been filled with His Spirit. Your heart is now a heart for God.

I can’t explain everything about that, of course, because I’m only a baby in that sense, walking in the Spirit. But I present it to you because I think it’s what the Bible calls us to, and it’s what many Christians of the past have testified to.

I know for myself, there are times when I have thoughts that guide my decisions. I take this series on Acts— I already knew what I was going to preach about a few weeks ago, and then it all got changed. It would have been easier—by a lot—for me to preach what I was planning. But I thought, "Oh, I think I’m supposed to shift gears."

A bigger life decision for me—you know, I’ve told you before I was a math and computer science major. I was ace at everything. Speech was my worst grade. And I had this sense—this thought that kept growing and growing: I’ve got to be a preacher of the gospel. What do I do with that?

It goes beyond your rational analysis. I wasn’t good at speech—I was good at math. But sometimes, the Lord wants people to be in math or accounting or other occupations—not me.

There are times when the Holy Spirit will just give you thoughts that are so strong you can’t get rid of them. Maybe one way to evaluate thoughts—unless you’re just totally obsessive and always have the same thoughts—is this: Sometimes, things keep coming to you again and again. That doesn’t mean it’s automatically divine communication, but if something keeps coming to your mind repeatedly, and you think it might be from God—take it very seriously. If God keeps impressing similar things on your heart over and over again, listen.

And then beyond what I might call the Lord implanting a thought or feeling, just the way the Lord shapes your entire mind, it's very closely related, but it's different. He grows you into a mature, wise person where it can be said, not just that you’re having thoughts from the Spirit or feelings or leadings from the Spirit, but that you have the mind of the Spirit, where you have the mind of Christ.

We’ve received the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. We have the mind of Christ. The apostle prays, he says, "I keep on praying that God will give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation so that you’ll know him better. And I pray that the eyes of your heart will be enlightened." He prays that people will be filled with the Spirit so they can understand what God’s will is. The mind of the Spirit is life and peace. He who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit.

You know, that's just worth thinking about. Just think about those phrases: "mind of Christ," "mind of the Spirit." You can read large volumes on it, but just let it be impressed on you that you can have a mind shaped by who Jesus is—a mind that's in tune with him, the mind of the Holy Spirit. These are tender and very precious mysteries. I know a lot of people have a hard time even talking about it to fellow believers because they say, "Well, I had kind of a..." You know, people will think I’m weird, or maybe they just... But these are some of the most precious things that can happen to you by the work of the Holy Spirit.

And then there is the miraculous. There are signs, voices, visions, angels, prophecies, interventions. Don’t be too quick to write those off. Don’t be too quick to think that’s the normal way the Holy Spirit always communicates with everybody. But don’t dismiss it either.

I’ll take one example from later in church history—the vision of the man from Macedonia. We could say, well, that happens in the book of Acts, and it did. There was a guy named Patricius who got kidnapped by pirates and was made a slave in Ireland. And then he escaped slavery. But while he was in slavery, he began to pray to the God that he’d heard about growing up but didn’t take very seriously. And he came to have a living faith in Christ while he was being held and enslaved. But finally, he gets out of there, and he escapes, and he’s back in England.

And then one night, Patrick has a vision: "I had a dream of a man who seemed to come from Ireland, and he carried countless letters, one of which he handed over to me. I read aloud where that letter began, 'The voice of the Irish.'" And he says in his dream, as he read that voice of the Irish, he heard voices like men from the Irish forest where he had been. And the voices were saying in unison, "We appeal to you, boy. Come and walk among us once more."

And so Saint Patrick goes back to Ireland to evangelize the slaveholders and the pagans whom he had just been so relieved to escape from. He would not have done that without a great intervention and a very forceful vision from the Lord. Just as in other situations, the Holy Spirit will intervene in our lives and move us in a direction that we might not have considered without it.

But I will say this about the more miraculous kinds of leadings—it’s likely that you don’t need to go looking for them. When an angel shows up, you’ll know it, okay? When the Holy Spirit gives you a vision, or if Christ does come in an extraordinary way—and he still does today, sometimes in converting people—one of the most common forms of conversion among Muslims is having a vision of Jesus Christ. They have a vision, and that impresses them that Christ is really who he is said to be.

So again, I do not want to turn the miraculous into everything, but we certainly ought not to reduce it to nothing and say, "Well, that was nice that that happened back in the book of Acts; we’re in a totally different era." We’re in the era of the Holy Spirit still. It’s not the era of the apostles; it’s not the foundation-laying era. I’m not going to claim to be an apostle where I have some of the mighty gifts of healing and so on that they had to attest to the gospel message that God gave them.

But the Holy Spirit does intervene. And when he does, you’re not going to have to go seeking and wondering whether this little hunch was the same as the vision from Macedonia. You may have to think about your hunches, but it’s not the same thing as the vision of the man from Macedonia or the angel who spoke to you very clearly and unmistakably.

And therefore, as we think about being led by the Spirit, we want a fully rounded view of how the Spirit leads from the book of Acts and the rest of the Scriptures. And as I said before, just forget all the other ones if you’re not reading the Bible. To be Bible-saturated is the first step in getting the mind of Christ. He applies the Scriptures to our lives, so be in the Scriptures.

If you haven’t been reading the Bible—well, I hate to say it, because I put a lot of work into this sermon—but just forget this whole sermon and read your Bible, okay?

And then, be a person of prayer and worship. Find leaders—a body of leaders—that set an example worth following and that follow the Bible’s teaching accurately. Look at the events of your life and don’t just resent the people who made life miserable for you. Say, "Well, is God moving me into a different phase or into something new here? What are the opportunities he’s giving me?"

Remember the persecution. Did they say, "Oh, Stephen’s dead. All is lost. We’re ruined. Now we’re in a different town, far from home." No—they said, "Oh, we’re here. Why are we here? Oh yeah, we have a gospel—let’s start talking." And so they preached the gospel wherever they went. When God puts you somewhere, he’s got purposes. So seize the purposes with the power of the Holy Spirit.

Be aware of what he’s doing in your own spirit and mind. Some of us are so rushed, you’re not going to hear the Spirit speaking in your mind quite so readily if it’s wall-to-wall noise all day, where you’re either watching the tube, consulting your phone, or looking to all those other sources of infallible wisdom.

You might want to listen to your own spirit long enough to hear God’s Spirit as well. And then, keep on praying. Keep on seeking to grow a whole mind, not just a leading here or a nudge there, but a mind that thinks like Jesus and chooses like Jesus.

Because you know what? When you read in the book of Acts, you’ll read that God directed in those amazing ways. But when he gives you that mind, then you start saying things like Paul did: "Philippians, I think it’s necessary." "Thessalonians, we thought it best." He writes to the Corinthians, "It seems advisable." He’s not always saying, "I had a vision of this." You know, "We’re thinking, we’re Christian people—he’s given us the mind of Christ. So we’re thinking and we’re making decisions."

We’re not going to wait around and say, "I’m never going to make a decision unless I have that extraordinary vision or angel." No—we’re going to keep on growing and making decisions in a godly way. And if God wants a different one, he can intervene. You know, I’ve said that many times too. I’ve said, "Well, I like the ministry that I’m doing at Christian Leaders. I like the ministry that I’m doing here. If God doesn’t want me to do it and wants me somewhere else, he better make it clear. Otherwise, I’m going to keep going."

So, sometimes, you know, I’m not going to say, "Well, every day I have to have a new sign." I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing until he gives me a reason to do something different. And I think you can take that approach too, where you say, "Well, God, I’m a Spirit-filled person. God guides me. But I am open to change if he wants me to take a different direction."

But I can’t end without simply saying what a blessing it is to have the Holy Spirit given, to have him living in you, to be led, to know that you’re not your own. You’ve got somebody with you, and he’s in front of you, he’s behind you, he’s all around you. He’s going to take you where he wants you to be, and he’s going to achieve amazing purposes through you. Even the little things you do can turn into really big things—because somebody really big is at work in those little things.

Prayer

We thank you, Lord, for the gift of the Holy Spirit. We do pray for your wisdom and for your guidance—not to be misled by false spirits or other ways that Satan would try to confuse us—but instead, Lord, to be deeply grounded in your Word, in a life of prayer, in godly leadership, in trust in your providence, and in how you arrange all events to accomplish your purposes in us.

And then, Lord, give us a sensitivity in our spirit to listen, to be quiet, and listen to what’s going on inside us, and what you’re saying and moving inside us. We pray, Lord, that the mind of Christ, our Savior, will live in us every day. And then, Lord, where you choose to still send us other kinds of leading that you’ve decided we need, help us, Lord, to be open to that—but also, Lord, to be open to every form of guidance that you’re already giving us.

We pray, Lord, that this church may be led by you. We pray that your entire church may be empowered and guided and revived to accomplish your purposes in our world. For Jesus' sake, Amen.